Facsimile equipment
AssigneeKabushiki Kaisha Toshiba
InventorsMasako Nozawa, Yumiko Yamaguchi
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A facsimile equipment in which a document data received from another facsimile equipment is once stored in an image memory and the document data can be transmitted to another facsimile equipment directly from the image memory without printing out the received document data and then reading the printed document. Further, the facsimile equipment also has a function of transmitting the document data in a circulation manner by transmitting circulation table together with the document data. By defining the handling of the circulation table in each of the destination facsimile equipments, the document data can be automatically circulated among the facsimile equipments.
Claims12
A facsimile communication system having at least three facsimile machines connected to each other through a communication channel, wherein document data is transmitted sequentially to the at least three facsimile machines based on circulation table data attached to the document data and transmitted with the document data, at least one of the facsimile machines comprising:
- an image memory for storing the document data;
- input means for inputting a plurality of facsimile circular transmission destinations according to a circulation order, the circulation order defining an order for sequentially transferring the document data to the at least three facsimile machines;
- first management data memory means for storing the circular transmission destinations and the circulation order as a new circulation table data;
- second management data memory means for storing the circulation table data attached to the document data received from another one of the facsimile machines;
- circulation table data updating means for updating the circulation table data received from another one of the facsimile machines by entering that circulation is finished at a portion of the circulation table data that shows the at least one of the facsimile machines as a circular transmission destination, and by deleting the at least one of the facsimile machines as a circular transmission destination from the circulation table data;
- retrieval means for sequentially retrieving a next transmission destination on the basis of the new circulation table data or the updated circulation table data, the next transmission destination having the highest position in the circulation order among transmission destinations to which circulation has not finished;
- calling control means for calling the next transmission destination, and if connection to the next transmission destination is unsuccessful, for sequentially calling the retrieved circular transmission destination having the subsequent highest position in the circulation order until interconnection to one of the circular transmission destinations is successful;
- and
- transmission control means for transmitting, to the circular transmission destination connected through the calling operation by the calling control means, the document data stored in the image memory and the new circulation table data, or the document data received with the circulation table data and the updated circulation table data,
- whereby the circulation order is updated according to the circulation table data received from the circular transmission destinations so that the document data is sequentially transmitted until the circulation table data indicates that circulation has finished to all of the circular transmission destinations.
A facsimile machine connected to other facsimile machines through a communication channel, wherein document data is transmitted sequentially to the other facsimile machines based on circulation table data attached to the document data and transmitted with the document data, the facsimile machine comprising:
- an image memory for storing document data;
- input means for inputting a plurality of facsimile circular transmission destinations according to a circulation order, the circulation order defining an order for sequentially transferring the document data to the other facsimile machines;
- first management data memory means for storing the circular transmission destinations and the circulation order as a new circulation table data;
- second management data memory means for storing the circulation table data attached to the document data received from one of the other facsimile machines;
- circulation table data updating means for updating the circulation table data received from one of the other facsimile machines by entering that circulation is finished at a portion of the circulation table data that shows the facsimile machine as a circular transmission destination, and by deleting the facsimile machine as a circular transmission destination from the circulation table data;
- retrieval means for sequentially retrieving a next transmission destination on the basis of the new circulation table data or the updated circulation table data, the next transmission destination having the highest position in the circulation order among transmission destinations to which circulation has not finished;
- calling control means for calling the next transmission destination and if connection to the next transmission destination is unsuccessful, for sequentially calling the retrieved circular transmission destination having the subsequent highest position in the circulation order until interconnection to one of the circular transmission destinations is successful;
- and
- transmission control means for transmitting, to the circular transmission destination connected through the calling operation by the calling control means, the document data stored in the image memory and the new circulation table data, or the document data received with the circulation table data and the updated circulation table data,
- whereby the circulation order is updated according to the circulation table data received from the circular transmission destinations so that the document data is sequentially transmitted until the circulation table data indicates that the circulation has finished to all of the circular transmission destinations.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.